Malaysia Airlines flight MH370-Updates and Discussion

MonkieSocks

Terrible tragedy.

My heart goes out to the members of the families.


_______________________________

Malaysia Airlines had another problem today

http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/23/world/asia/malaysia-airlines-flight-diverted/

Happyman42

ProfessorPlum wrote: »

Which is why I said, the technology is already there and used.

No it isn't. I'm talking about technology that is independent of the pilot and can't be simply switched off.

Bill G

Happyman42 wrote: »

No it isn't. I'm talking about technology that is independent of the pilot and can't be simply switched off.

So it can malfunction and cause a fire and the pilot can't remove power to it? Great idea.

sopretty

Bill G wrote: »

So it can malfunction and cause a fire and the pilot can't remove power to it? Great idea.

Bill, can you comment on my earlier post and let me know if I've gotten things assways? :P:

"Maybe I misinterpreted the Inmarsat SVP speaking today, but according to him, the traceability technology (a step-up from the very basic Pings detected from this plane), which would give altitude, speed, co-ordinates & direction, is already available and in use. Since MH370 continued to 'ping' even after the other comms systems were disabled, one would assume, the upgraded version with more detailed info, would also transmit and not be able to be manually disabled?
He said it would cost about $1 per hour (presumably per hour flight time!)."

Bill G

I don't know, sopretty, I didn't see the interview with the Inmarsat person.

Jack1985

I'm talking about technology that is independent of the pilot and can't be simply switched off.

Who in their right mind would want that?

Happyman42

Bill G wrote: »

So it can malfunction and cause a fire and the pilot can't remove power to it? Great idea.

That is the challenge.
We wouldn't fly at all without calculated risks, this would just be another one.
Is a fire in the cargo area waiting for a pilot's intervention or will systems kick in to put it out?
Would having 3 or 4 systems on separate power feeds work?
I don't know what the solution is, all I know is that the status quo isn't really acceptable, above and beyond what caused this flight to go down.

sopretty

Bill G wrote: »

I don't know, sopretty, I didn't see the interview with the Inmarsat person.

Here's a link to one of the interviews with him, but there was more from him today (maybe the full length of that interview), where he explained to the journalist about the more advanced type of satellite tracking and what info that could contain.

As, from my understanding, it's just a ping from a satellite, it wouldn't necessarily need to be controlled at all by a pilot. Assuming, it's literally just an upgrade of this simple pinging satellite system!

http://news.sky.com/story/1231155/inmarsat-how-missing-flight-mh370-was-tracked

kona

cosanostra wrote: »

Would the black box be capable of recording the entire flight time or if they find it will all they get be the final hour or so of the flight which wouldn't really give them the critical info they need?

There will be nothing on the black box IF somebody purposely disabled the systems.

sopretty

Actually, the written article contains some of what he was saying
I'm not sure why they haven't included the specific bits I heard, maybe because it was a bit of a plug on his part to get the contract for the new upgrades! He was on about the fact that ships have a similar system now, under international agreement.


Mr McLoughlin believes all commercial planes should now be fitted with existing technology provided by Inmarsat and other satellite companies that would prevent prolonged searches like this unfolding in future.

"Every commercial aircraft could be tracked, if not tomorrow then by the end of next week," he said.

"Just imagine if the data had been coming off the plane for a couple of hours while it was missing.

"There is even an outside possibility, if it had been realised quickly enough, that interceptor jets could have been sent up to see what was going on.

"Many airlines choose to do it already; over the north Atlantic it's mandated. It needs to be mandated everywhere and it could be delivered tomorrow.

"It would be a quick win that would at least make some sense of this. It sometimes takes a major tragedy to move things."

ProfessorPlum

Happyman42 wrote: »

That is the challenge.
We wouldn't fly at all without calculated risks, this would just be another one.
Is a fire in the cargo area waiting for a pilot's intervention or will systems kick in to put it out?
Would having 3 or 4 systems on separate power feeds work?
I don't know what the solution is, all I know is that the status quo isn't really acceptable, above and beyond what caused this flight to go down.

You are specifically calculating the risk to be the pilot purposely turning off all tracking devices / communications devices already installed, and replacing that risk with the risk of the pilot being unable to isolate a piece of faulty equipment.
Anyone like to do a risk analysis on that for us?

doriansmith

lb1 wrote: »

We were told that there was 4 passengers on false passports but we only got details about the 2 Iranians. What happened to the guy that looked like Balotelli???

Apparently this is something that was misconstrued by the press. The spokesman never said that anyone looked like Balotelli. He just used him as an example of someone who is an Italian national but doesn't look like a stereotypical Italian.

Panda_Turtle

cosanostra wrote: »

Would the black box be capable of recording the entire flight time or if they find it will all they get be the final hour or so of the flight which wouldn't really give them the critical info they need?

From Wiki

Most FDRs record approximately 17–25 hours worth of data in a continuous loop

pfurey101

More good gen from a pilots forum re the methodology used by Inmarsat:

Member Golf-Mike-Mike


"Because INMARSAT have also reviewed the pings from other Malaysian 777s that flew northerly routes and their doppler signature was different to that received from MH370. As that rules out a northerly track it places the missing aircraft in the southern Indian Ocean, without a landing site anywhere near, and hence the need to tell the families that there is now no hope of survival.

[ edit to add this, from BBC]

Engineers spent all weekend looking back at previous Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 flights, going back several weeks. They compared the satellite data from those flights with flight MH370 and were able to work out it went south.

This is cutting-edge modelling, never tried before. It uses the Doppler effect - which is what makes a police siren sound different from different points.

They had it reviewed by other scientists before handing it over.
As far as they can tell, the plane was flying at cruising height, above 30,000ft. They found no evidence of fluctuating heights being reported.

This is it now - they cannot pinpoint the position any further. They handed this data over on Sunday morning"

GTE

Panda_Turtle wrote: »

From Wiki

Can a pilot confirm this? I was told by one that the voice recorder does a 2 hour loop with the data recording a bit more.

Jack1985

CVR records for two hours, there used to be a requirement of 30 minutes - Regards the FDR it records about 25hrs of data.

Happyman42

ProfessorPlum wrote: »

You are specifically calculating the risk to be the pilot purposely turning off all tracking devices / communications devices already installed, and replacing that risk with the risk of the pilot being unable to isolate a piece of faulty equipment.
Anyone like to do a risk analysis on that for us?

I am simply saying that an aircraft shouldn't be able to disappear like this.
I think you will find that big moves will be made to make sure it won't happen again, it is too big a risk in the modern world.
As I say, the risk will be calculated.

Can a plane hide from a satellite btw, I'd imagine that is where the solution will lie.

fits

pfurey101 wrote: »

More good gen from a pilots forum re the methodology used by Inmarsat:

Member Golf-Mike-Mike


"Because INMARSAT have also reviewed the pings from other Malaysian 777s that flew northerly routes and their doppler signature was different to that received from MH370. As that rules out a northerly track it places the missing aircraft in the southern Indian Ocean, without a landing site anywhere near, and hence the need to tell the families that there is now no hope of survival.

[ edit to add this, from BBC]

Engineers spent all weekend looking back at previous Malaysian Airlines Boeing 777 flights, going back several weeks. They compared the satellite data from those flights with flight MH370 and were able to work out it went south.

This is cutting-edge modelling, never tried before. It uses the Doppler effect - which is what makes a police siren sound different from different points.

They had it reviewed by other scientists before handing it over.
As far as they can tell, the plane was flying at cruising height, above 30,000ft. They found no evidence of fluctuating heights being reported.

This is it now - they cannot pinpoint the position any further. They handed this data over on Sunday morning"

Science rocks! that is brilliant work in fairness.

sopretty

Inmarsat guy speaking on Sky now.

Only info coming from classic aero terminal built into the aircraft, to the network, were these hourly pings. Similar to a sonar signal. No position data coming with ping, as its not mandated in that area of the world.

That's the gist of what he's saying. In layman's terms!

relaxed

Happyman42 wrote: »

I am simply saying that an aircraft shouldn't be able to disappear like this.
I think you will find that big moves will be made to make sure it won't happen again, it is too big a risk in the modern world.
As I say, the risk will be calculated.

Can a plane hide from a satellite btw, I'd imagine that is where the solution will lie.

In fairness given the number of commercial flights 365 days a year around the world I think the risk is quite low.

And what difference will it make, either pilots . hijackers are capable of crashing a plane or they are not.

The alternative is some sort of land based system where ground staff can override the pilots and take control of the plane.

Can't see that one working as you could have a hacker take control of loads of planes and crash them all.

So its back to trusting the pilots to fly the plane.

lb1

sopretty wrote: »

I had forgotten about Balotelli!
Were there definitely 4 false passports? Or was that later debunked and clarified as being 2? Can't remember after all the twists and turns!

I never heard anyone say there was not 4 false passport holders on the plane. And the Balotelli lookalike was mentioned once and never again, very strange.

Also whats this people are saying about the two Iranians having their images photoshopped?

sopretty

lb1 wrote: »

I never heard anyone say there was not 4 false passport holders on the plane. And the Balotelli lookalike was mentioned once and never again, very strange.

Also whats this people are saying about the two Iranians having their images photoshopped?

Dorian, in post 4485, clarified this ^^^ for us.

I think the images of the Iranians were literally just a case of placing one image on top of the other on a photocopier or something!

lb1

sopretty wrote: »

Dorian, in post 4485, clarified this ^^^ for us.

I think the images of the Iranians were literally just a case of placing one image on top of the other on a photocopier or something!

Another example of the monumental ineptitude of the Malaysians.

fits

Has this video link been posted yet? really interesting stuff.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26723980#TWEET1081180

Sala

The location looks as if they weren't heading anywhere specific. Would it be the case that after flying for that long they ran out of fuel?

Happyman42

relaxed wrote: »

In fairness given the number of commercial flights 365 days a year around the world I think the risk is quite low.

And what difference will it make, either pilots . hijackers are capable of crashing a plane or they are not.

The alternative is some sort of land based system where ground staff can override the pilots and take control of the plane.

Can't see that one working as you could have a hacker take control of loads of planes and crash them all.

So its back to trusting the pilots to fly the plane.

Well, they certainly didn't take that attitude after 9-11...'what difference will extra security make?'

I think there will be a lot of people surprised and alarmed that a plane can go missing like this and be airborne for so long.
Something will be done, whether with an in plane system or the act of turning the transponders off creating an instant alarm somewhere on the ground.
As has been said, each crash teaches us something about safety, and the safety of people on the ground is important too, even if the flight is doomed.

fits

lb1 wrote: »

I never heard anyone say there was not 4 false passport holders on the plane. And the Balotelli lookalike was mentioned once and never again, very strange.

Also whats this people are saying about the two Iranians having their images photoshopped?

There was never a balotelli lookalike! his point was that balotelli doesn't look Italian so these passengers don't have to look Austrian etc to be Austrian. (and they would have passed as European). They were found to be no more suspicious than any other passenger after investigation.

Mountainsandh

Happyman42 wrote: »

Well, they certainly didn't take that attitude after 9-11...'what difference will extra security make?'

I think there will be a lot of people surprised and alarmed that a plane can go missing like this and be airborne for so long.
Something will be done, whether with an in plane system or the act of turning the transponders off creating an instant alarm somewhere on the ground.
As has been said, each crash teaches us something about safety, and the safety of people on the ground is important too, even if the flight is doomed.

I tend to agree, and don't understand the outrage of others here.
When you have the responsibility of taking so many lives from A to B up in the air, you should accept a certain level of scrutiny.

Now, my question is : can the pilots disable the black box ?

If the answer is no, then there's a piece of equipment that cannot currently be disabled.

Happyman42

Mountainsandh wrote: »

I tend to agree, and don't understand the outrage of others here.
When you have the responsibility of taking so many lives from A to B up in the air, you should accept a certain level of scrutiny.

Now, my question is : can the pilots disable the black box ?

If the answer is no, then there's a piece of equipment that cannot currently be disabled.

I've also asked, can the pilot disable the contact with the satellite? As the British scientists are saying that if the info sent had been mandated to include height and position they'd have found it in an instant.

relaxed

Happyman42 wrote: »

Well, they certainly didn't take that attitude after 9-11...'what difference will extra security make?'

I think there will be a lot of people surprised and alarmed that a plane can go missing like this and be airborne for so long.
Something will be done, whether with an in plane system or the act of turning the transponders off creating an instant alarm somewhere on the ground.
As has been said, each crash teaches us something about safety, and the safety of people on the ground is important too, even if the flight is doomed.

I am not sure that you get my point, suppose the pilot can't switch the transponder off, suppose they introduce extra GPS tracking to know where the plane is - its not going to change the outcome, if the person flying the plane wants to crash it knowing where the plane is won't change the outcome.

9/11 solutions were different, locking the cockpit for example prevented terrorists storming it.

I just don't see how knowing where the plane is will change the outcome if the person in control wants to crash it.